Femi Falana to Lead Legal Team in Corruption Probe Against Former Governor Nasir El-Rufai
Kaduna, Nigeria — The Kaduna State House of Assembly has retained the services of prominent human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), to prosecute former Governor Nasir El-Rufai on charges of corruption. SaharaReporters has learned that Falana will lead a team of lawyers to begin unraveling the monumental corruption allegations on Thursday in Kaduna.
In July, the Kaduna State House of Assembly reaffirmed its stance on allegations of financial misconduct against former Governor El-Rufai. According to the Assembly’s findings, El-Rufai’s administration allegedly diverted a staggering sum of N423,115,028,072.88 during his tenure.
The Assembly also condemned attempts by some political appointees, who recently held a press conference in Abuja, to discredit the House and conceal the alleged fraud committed by the El-Rufai government. In a statement released by the Chairman of the Fact-Finding Committee and Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, Henry Magaji, it was stated, “The attention of the Kaduna State House of Assembly has been drawn to a press conference addressed by some senior political appointees of the immediate past administration of Malam Nasir El-Rufai.
“In the press conference, the former political appointees made strenuous efforts to pick holes in the report of the Probe Committee. They resorted to name-calling and wild allegations on the motivations for the House Probe. We wish to state as follows:
“The press conference was just a rehash of the vituperations and innuendoes heaped on us by the former political appointees in their first press briefing. There was nothing new that should warrant our response. They failed to address the main issue, which is the systematic and coordinated cornering of the resources of Kaduna State through phoney contracts and outright looting.”
Magaji further criticized the former appointees, stating, “If they genuinely have the interest of Kaduna State and are truly men and women of integrity, they would have applied themselves to developing the state instead of participating in the alleged pilfering of its scarce resources.”
In June, the State House of Assembly demanded the immediate refund of N36 billion allegedly paid for illegal contractual transactions by El-Rufai’s government. This demand was based on recommendations submitted by the House Committee set up to probe alleged fraud and abuse of office by El-Rufai’s administration. The committee stated that the El-Rufai government paid N36 billion for contracts that were not executed, violating state procurement laws.
The committee’s findings highlighted several contractors who were to refund a total of N36,351,126,811.65, including Ronchess Global Resources PLC, Chamberlayne Global Concept Ltd, and CCECC Nigeria Ltd, among others. Additionally, unjustified cash withdrawals totaling N4,936,916,333.00 made between 2019 and 2022 by the Commissioner of Finance and the Accountant General of the State were recommended for further investigation by law enforcement agencies.
The committee also identified the unjustified withdrawal of $1.4 million USD from the Kaduna State Economic Transformation Account and a payment of N632,456,000.00 to Tulip Future Associates Ltd without official engagement as consultants, both of which were referred to relevant law enforcement agencies for investigation and recovery.
With Falana leading the legal team, the Assembly aims to bring transparency and accountability to the alleged financial misconduct during El-Rufai’s tenure.